A Structural and Civil Engineering Blog ■ How to become a small business owner ■ How not to lose your mind doing it ■ How to take risks and still be regarded as a safe pair of hands ■ St Albans and Hertfordshire
"...a failed structure provides a counterexample to a hypothesis and shows us incontrovertibly what cannot be done, while a structure that stands without incident often conceals whatever lessons or caveats it might hold for the next generation of engineers."Henry Petroski. Professor of Civil Engineering and History.
25 Years ago, the BBC in partnership with Henry Petroski released an hour long engaging documentary on engineering and engineers.
5 great tips for students in engineering college [university]. This movie edit was inspired by a great little find on YouTube [here]. In this 'how to' video by UCaccend - they talk of how to refine your study strategy for surviving in university, if you are taking an engineering degree. "Do your maths homework".
Please pop over and tell them how good their videos are ;-)
We decided to add our own personal touches to create our video - a kind of a parody. For fun and your entertainment, we also added a backing track, and spliced in some more engineering video clips which were brought to our attention over the last few weeks. Thank you!
We hope you enjoy this, and it is an experiment - much the same as the crowd funding venture which we kick-started a week ago [here]. Please pleaseclick on the link and show your support. Even if it is just a message, we welcome it :-)
We believe that it is as important that we as engineers not only innovate using building materials, and during the construction process BUT it is becoming more and more important that we engage and support engineering social endeavours too. This being one of them.
So, if you have any questions about what it is I am trying to do - then first have a read of the link above and then email me.
Over the last few weeks, I have unofficially researched and curiously paid interest to what our industry has to offer on video platforms such as Vimeo and YouTube.
I am referring to of course online structural engineering videos which have been 'set free' over the web during the last 5 years or so. The assumptions are that these videos have been attentively shot, edited and uploaded in order to inform prospective graduates, graduates, the public at large, and our very own structural engineers upon what it is that our industry is currently up to. Added benefits could also include answering questions like, why we are best positioned to carry out construction project management and design, and to ultimately celebrate in our successes.
WHY VIDEO?
The current thinking is that the search engine optimising benefits which have been pervasively touted by SEO marketers and advisers the world over, are not the only benefits to be gained from a well executed video campaign. Of the many advantages which have been highlighted are increased brand awareness, credibility, and extra opportunities to advertise on searchable ranking websites - like YouTube. Also, we must recognise as a general rule of thumb, that we prefer to watch videos rather than read long essays.
With this in mind, I set about hunting out some easily searchable examples to review. I used the following keywords on Vimeo and YouTube; IStructE, structural engineering, and structural design. I deliberately restricted the keywords to these. My wish was to emulate the searches of a person who is interested in what our industry might be doing.
THE AUDIENCE
We have already touched upon who we might be communicating to through our video submissions. The types of questions which could very well be on the mind of someone searching for more information are as follows;
What exactly does a Structural Engineer do? On a day to day basis.
Do I have what it takes to be an Engineer?
How interesting or fun might a career in Engineering be?
Are Engineers widely respected?.. and are they paid well?
Where can I find an Engineer near to me?
The questions above are only a taster of possible lines of enquiry. I feel that without understanding the 'why' part of why someone may search out knowledge of our industry, then reviewing these videos may lose most of its meaning. Box ticked.
SO... WHAT DID WE FIND?
This is it. I typed in the keywords and let the video platforms do their thing, then chose my guinea pigs from the first page of results only. I reviewed and marked them on Presentation, Information, Interest and Call-to-action. Presentation - this includes editing quality, music & audio quality. Information - how well do they answer the questions which may have brought you to the video in the first place? Interest - does the video hold your interest and convey the engineering 'spirit'? Call-to-Action - Is there an under lying message and how inspirational was it?
1. Structural Engineering - produced by the Yorkshire Branch [254views]
Presentation:2/5 Information: 4/5 Interest: 2/5 CTA:1/5 TOTAL = 9/20
It is a shame that the first minute of this film had to be plagued with an annoying sound track. Further investigation has led me to believe that the music may be some kind of unofficial IStructE theme tune. My advice would be this. Lose the music. Do it now. I did love the 'stupid street' style interviews and the presenter was quite... well... well presented. I did not feel inspired, but would have felt educated [if I didn't know most of what was coming anyway]. Good start, but lots to improve upon if we are really serious about inspiring students and Engineers to surpass their wildest dreams. Hit the snooze button on this one.
2. Structural Engineer - produced by CBIA Videos [16,858 views]
Presentation:1/5 Information: 3/5 Interest: 2/5 CTA:1/5 TOTAL = 7/20
Again quite a low score. A self titled 'day in the life of an Engineer'. What has always been a bug bear of mine, is people not being able to describe what it is we do without using the word Architect in the sentence. There is nothing interesting about this video, yet it has landed 16,858 views. Go figure. Perhaps it was more to do with the attractive looking Engineer and her rather impractical site boots? Please let me know if you see the more to this video than I. Less said about the music the better. Grrrrrr......
3. Civil and Structural Engineering, the ICE - produced by the University of Bradford SoEDT [7,024views]
Presentation:3/5 Information: 4/5 Interest: 3/5 CTA:3/5 TOTAL = 13/20
This is the first video to make double figures and has a quite healthy viewer count too. All in all I enjoyed it and felt that they have managed to build into the film a feeling of pride and awe at what the featured Engineers have accomplished thus far in their careers. A great touch was the interview and pithy one liners from Dan Cruikshank "it is the Engineer, at the end of the day who is the heart of every building project".
4. What is Structural Engineering? - produced by the University of Strathclyde, Architecture [82 views]
Presentation:3/5 Information: 5/5 Interest: 2/5 CTA:2/5 TOTAL = 12/20
What I most liked about this video is that it did exactly what the title promised, and guess what - it managed to describe what we do with razor like precision, WITHOUT having to evoke the relationship between Engineer and Architect. I felt that my time hadn't been wasted by watching it [unlike most of the earlier films] - and would recommend that it is reviewed by those who are looking to understand what it is that we do. Just goes to show that if you keep to a plan, you may well achieve a desirable result.
5. Wildcard films [210,000 approx views between them]
I decided to research a few other films which were recommended to me, or found through accident. All of them are related to Engineering and therefore should be considered. You need to watch each and every one of these films, they are incredible.
i] Chartered Engineers - by Engineers Ireland. Presentation:5/5 Information: 3/5 Interest: 5/5 CTA:5/5 TOTAL = 18/20. Simply gorgeous film.
ii] 'Engineers are Cool' - by Arup. Presentation:5/5 Information: 3/5 Interest: 5/5 CTA:5/5 TOTAL = 18/20. Very clever and energising. Inspirational.
iii] 'The Knack' - by Dilbert. Presentation:4/5 Information: 2/5 Interest: 5/5 CTA:3/5 TOTAL = 14/20. Random but has a great message. Pokes fun at Engineers. Very very funny.
The wild card films featured above for all intents and purposes fulfilled the need to be creative and deliver an awe inspiring message. They advertised our potential and celebrated our successes as Engineers. Albeit from a more holistic point of view. The first four films do not seem to be able to exact the same response. Never has the theory behind selling the sizzle, rather than the sausage itself ever been more pertinent.
It goes without saying that the viewing figures for the final three films are astronomical when compared to the initial four examples.
Conclusions? Yes - we have a long way to go before the use of film can be accepted as one of the strings to our marketing bow. All the first four films sent my non-engineering test subjects to sleep before the message had been delivered. The remaining three films both delighted and intrigued the audience.
The question remaining is. Do we want to engage potential engineering students and the public or not?
"...a failed structure provides a counterexample to a hypothesis and shows us incontrovertibly what cannot be done, while a structure that stands without incident often conceals whatever lessons or caveats it might hold for the next generation of engineers." Henry Petroski. Professor of Civil Engineering and History.
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